Yousaf's SNP deserves to fall and Scotland deserves election

Wouldn’t you just love to play Humza Yousaf at chess? You’d have him beat in two swift moves using the old Fool’s Mate before he could blink.

Imagine him having a go at Poker? His ministerial bank account would be empty before the last card fell.

Our nation’s leader woke up on Thursday morning thinking he was about to pull off the political coup of the century. By tea-time, though, he was contemplating his own P45.

Whoever is advising Yousaf must have had a previous job with Liz Truss. Yousaf dug a bear-trap, covered it with leaves, pushed the Greens into it, and then jumped down beside them.

By booting the Greens out of office, he’s triggered a vote of no confidence in both himself and his government.

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Now the Greens will most likely have their revenge and vote against him and the SNP along with Labour, the Tories and the LibDems. Only by grovelling to Alba’s Ash Regan can Yousaf survive.

He has to go on bended knee to the MSP who came up with the ‘Independence Thermometer’ idea. That’s how bad Scottish politics is today.

Yousaf’s ministers are as stupid as he is, evidently. They gleefully banged the table in the cabinet room like a bunch of overgrown private school-kids when they learned of the Greens removal. Now they might find themselves waiting for the removal vans.

Yousaf has already caved in to his party’s right-wing. If the only way for him to cling on to power is by getting Alex Salmond’s amanuensis Regan to prop him up, then watch his centre-left/liberal voters bail in droves.

Regan must already be cooking a humble pie for Yousaf to eat that’s so big it goes straight into the Guinness Book of Records. It’ll eclipse one of Desperate Dan’s Cow Pies. 

When she defected to Salmond’s bunch of oddballs, Yousaf referred to Regan as “not a particularly great loss”. Revenge – like humble pie – is a dish best served cold.

In fact, you know it’s all over for Yousaf thanks to the spectre of Stephen Flynn drifting on stage. The party’s Westminster boss has made arcane and convoluted comments hinting that he won’t stand as SNP leader if Yousaf resigns.

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The last time Flynn said he wouldn’t be sniffing around power was a few weeks before Ian Blackford got unceremoniously turfed out as Westminster leader. In November 2022, Flynn denied he was going to challenge Blackford, saying he’d “no intention of standing”.

By December, Blackford was gone. No doubt, Yousaf is currently hanging on every word Flynn whispers to him. 

Yousaf has no grasp of politics, and zero tactical or strategic nous. Send him to market with the family cow, and he’ll come back smiling with a handful of magic beans.

For that alone, he deserves to fall from power. His party deserves to fall with him and may well do.

If the vote of no confidence in Yousaf means the SNP can’t elect a new First Minister, or similar happens if the SNP loses the vote of no confidence in the government triggered by Scottish Labour, then you and I may well be going to the polls very soon.

Good luck to the SNP heading into an election after the Apoca-Shambles they’ve brought upon themselves.

What makes it all the more staggering is that they thought this gambit a good idea right at the moment when Scottish Labour has caught them in the polls.

The bottom line is this: Scotland deserves an election now. We’ve endured useless government and failed leadership for too long.

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It’s not just that the air needs cleared. The situation we’re now in means that all politicians – not just the Scottish government – are thinking of themselves, their careers and their party’s fortunes, not us.

That’s a gross dereliction of duty and an abuse of democracy. The people deserve better than this embarrassing joke of a parliament.